Monday, January 20, 2014

So this post is late... I've been busy but with an extra day off, I've felt like it's time to play catch up.
So on Wednesday morning at 3:30 am we were to meet at a church parking lot to get ready for an adventure to VEGAS!
Around 4:30 am we left Riverside, CA for Las Vegas, Nevada. With a pit stop at a Denny's in Bakers for breakfast.
It was a long night of driving, not for me but in the passenger seat it was. We filled the hours with old school music and just random stuff to pass the time. The time it takes to get to Bakers was only about an hour and a half so it wasn't too bad.
One oopsy was that the whole carpool thing failed on the way to Bakers. Normally we all stay together and follow each other, that failed miserably. After Bakers though it lasted until vegas woo! so that means only about a 50% fail?

Our carpool this year. 14 cars long!

Welcome to Nevada!

After getting into vegas, we parked at the hotel parking lot and made our way to the convention center. I am not gonna even lie about how much walking there was and it was so much better doing it in flat than heeled boots like I did last time.
We started with all the cars and there were so many. I'm not the biggest car person but so shinny and pretty! here's one of the booths to just show off 1, how many people and 2, the size of just the Ford booth.

#FordCES booth. There were sooooo many cars!

And camera stuff was great to see. I honestly didn't think there was like anything BRAND new and crazy, but it was still cool to see the new stuff they were going to be putting out and hear from the people themselves about the products they had.

Nikon

These were the large telescopic lens and they were amazing.

We left the convention a little early on the first day, at this point, I still only had 1 hour of sleep and we needed to still check into the hotel rooms. Before it was time to check in, and we needed everyone before we could check in, we went for dinner at Chipotle, just bc it was cheap.

and of course, all the guys on their smart phones.

After checking in and relaxing for a couple hours, there was an open bar at LAVO so we all, who were legal, ended up there.

Selfie with Randy and Sallia

Justin and Jerica, these two are just too cute.

LAVO SELFIE #CES2014

April and Joe

One more before the sign broke.

It was a great time clubbing with everyone, it allowed us all to just get away from our usual of only hanging out at the solarium and got to just have fun. There was cases of shoes coming off and not remembering the entire night but it was still lots of fun.

Day 2 of the conference was more exploring!

Poloraid camera, it's a new one!

And Project Runway winner Dom Streeter! It was great to see someone I knew!

At the IEEE booth

Even represented a bit

and with SWE <3

Belkin booth was HUGE

First we did the group buffet. The group buffet was at Paris but sadly we were not able to all site together. That part always sucks just a little bit but it makes sense to keep us from having to pay gratuity.
That evening a group of us went bull riding which I only have videos of. We grabbed a fat tuesday and headed down the strip to planet hollywood. It was too much fun. We even ended up on a party bus. The party bus was great there and back, it allowed everyone to just let loose and have fun with a random strip poll in the middle and the music blasting full blast.

Day 3 One more day of exploring but so tired I didn't actually go too far.

3D printer stuff

Brandon's head next to a 4K projector

more 3D printed cool stuff

Look who ended up on the INTEL book display

After the conference, which ended a little bit earlier, we hit the buffets to complete our 24 hour buffet.
It was pretty oblivious that all of us were getting pretty tired.

Brandon even fell asleep at the table.

Then one more night of clubbing at TAO with everyone. It wasn't quiet as fun as the first night but it was still a good time. I got a bunch of them to go dancing that weren't there the first night.

Andrew posing with the statues

It was crazy though, because first there was a guy hitting on a bunch of the girls in our group, a purse was stolen (but found thank goodness), and then Justin missed his bus. But it was fun to get to hang out with Kelly Kim again other people. But sucked since I then had to go and rework car situations with Justin. but it all worked out which is the best about that.

Because I had to be back before noon, we had to get up SUPER early. Up at 6:30 and left by 7:30

The sight out the window was gorgeous.

It was a long ride home while tired but Justin fell asleep and just had to take a picture

On the way home

It was a good trip, lots of fun and networking/bonding with my IEEE chapter and classmates.

Tuesday, January 7, 2014

My lab was canceled so I didn't have class till 3:40. It was nice, got to enjoy a little bit of a break at least.

At noon, I met up with Gis and we got to have lunch and just catch up. and talk about football! Shall we discuss them Chargers too? just kidding. But it was a good time and I finally got my doctor who extra large Tardis blanket! It's beautiful.

I put it on my bed so you can tell JUST how big it is!

(I have a full size bed btw)

But it was so exciting!

After that, met up with Roben to work on senior design stuff and built one of the circuits for our project. I wanted to do something even if I was missing senior design this week! And I should have taken a picture of it, but a 470uF capacitor is HUGE.

Had power electronics at 3:40 - 5 and Chomko ranted at us for like half the time through his lecture and what not. It's normal. I will say it did feel a little different again, I sat with Jackie, Jamila, and Josephine which hasn't been done in a while since we're all in different classes now and have no mandatory classes to take together anymore.

After class, had the first SWE board meeting for the quarter, it's gonna be a busy quarter, but a good one. I can feel it! Soooo much work but I'm excited. Hopefully Brenda and I can get a lot of planning done tomorrow before I have to leave! I just want to make sure it's all getting done (control freak in me coming out)

Then had another senior design meeting but they always tend to include dinner. I got chocolate chip pancakes! yumm!

As for senior design, we built another circuit for the project (yay!) and did a lot of singing to Frozen, off key sometimes but it was fun. Roben doesn't know any of the song titles though but he will eventually. It WILL happen!

Getting word done! It's a mess but we got there!

Speaking of Frozen, got the best thing ever from Stephanie on facebook.

Monday, January 6, 2014

SATURDAY
Saturday was the pretty easy, enjoyed last day at home and avoided everything that had to do with packing. Have I mentioned my dislike for packing?
My sister had work at Experium and other sister had religious education in the morning. After picking Alex up ended up at Happy Tails Dog spa and helping out/getting to just see all the dogs. I always love going there just because of the dogs. But there is also always good company.
Happy Tails is a Dog grooming business of a family friend and I never have a problem in helping out where I can.

These are her doggies, Gracie and Blackie.

In fact, you should check them out if you have a dog or recommend this place to friends!!

(free advertisement to people who deserve it!)

After we picked up Sam, even though she made us wait like 30 mins for her cause the guy after her was late... damn high schoolers.

Brought us to the mall were we tried to get food and that failed, since they're fixing up the mall, the food court was COMPLETELY Closed. such a fail.

So ended up an in-n-out
and eventually at the mall.

And at the mall, Alex got a free train ride from another one of my mom's friends.

Train booth to herself

She enjoyed it so that was all that mattered.

Then Church and me still avoiding everything that had to do with packing.

SUNDAY

All I did was run around the house and pack. And it sucked.

I always forget how I always seem to have a TON of stuff to bring home and so much more to bring back from break.

And good news was the 49ers won! WOO! whole time it was just close. Its a love hate relationship...

Once the roommates were back, most of them, we ended up coming home to a surprise!

HAMSTERS!

My roommate's instagram of Desmond and McCheeks

My picture with no fancy camera

It wasn't for us to keep sadly, 'Cause they were adorable, but one of my roommates was just watching them over the break.

A couple hours after all that, I ended up getting a phone call to meet up for In-N-Out. Apparently it's a tradition now. I met up with Brenda, Susie, Sandra, and Odalys for a here goes Winter Quarter late night dinner. It was a good laugh of randomness and inappropriateness and random talk of being sore. But it's always a good time with them.

Friday, January 3, 2014

With some great people from CSF, we went on an adventure to the Griffith Observatory!

Started off with Classic Disney music in the car and a round of guess the song and the movie it was from. Christina, growing up with it, knew them all but it was Franco and I guessing. As well, started playing the state license plate game. Every time one of us found an out of state license plate, the first number you were able to punch someone that many times. It continued out of the car and went on all day.

There were so many people so we ended up having a hike and a trip but it was still great.

This was a far away pic of LA

You could see the fog of LA and was was but it was still a beautiful day and the slight breeze was amazing.

It was clear enough to see the Hollywood sign!

A little bit closer now :]

It was just beautiful out there. Even though there were tons of people also looking around and enjoy the day. Honestly you wouldn't even believe it was winter with weather like it was.

At the entrance! So excited that I got to go for the first time.

LA sky.

After wandering around the observatory, we went inside and saw the telescope and there was an area that displayed all the planets. Jose, Ed and I thought they removed pluto. It was still there but just OH SO TINY! especially compared to Saturn. We also got the opportunity to see a seismograph and weigh ourselves on different planets. If it was possible to live on the other planets, Jupiter was gonna be my last choice.

We also saw a hit and run... technically. We saw a lady back her car into another car and it bumped it. It was alright since it didn't seem like any damage was done, the other car's dent popped right now but it was still a pretty big joke the rest of the day.

After we finished at the observatory we ended up at El Pollo Inka where I took no pictures, fail on my part. But we met up with Laura and Jerry and it was a good time trying out new peruvian foods. And the beef heart wasn't bad at all.

I then got to catch up with Dustin, Tammy, and Riju. Had dinner, well they did anyway and then went to Hooka. It was a good time with some old Saxon buddies.

Wednesday, January 1, 2014

I've lately blogged on tumblr. It's a great place but it's hard to do personal stuff there. The point of this blog is just as college life has 6th months left, I figured I'd start documenting the end of education and the beginning of working life.